No more rusty metal gate

This week I was looking through pictures from last year, longing for warmer days, when I found pictures of our pasture access gate. It was a rusty mess. We’ve looked at and walked through this gate a million times and couldn’t take the rust anymore. It was ugly, it made my hands red, it made noise and was in danger of disintegrating into a pile of rust. The solution was a simple one.

Our pasture has three gate access points: 1) through our back yard using this small rusty gate, 2) through our barn using a galvanized metal gate (no rust) and 3) via the road going past our place using a large rusty gate, big enough for a truck, tractor, etc. to get through. One summer day, we decided we had enough of the smaller rusty gate and picked up some primer and green Rustoleum at Walmart. The gate (pictured) took 2 cans of primer and 2 cans of paint. We selected green because it matched the color of the grass back then. What a huge difference it made in the appearance of our back yard.

A few thoughts when painting pasture fence and gate stuff:

Horses are curious creatures and have large nostrils with which to inhale psychedelic paint fumes (careful, those of you who have a horse that cribs/sucks wind/wood).

It’s easier to avoid getting paint on you with gloves than it is to wash paint off of your skin

Keep the horses away, especially if you’re using non-horse colors like white primer and green. Yes, horses come in white sometimes but mine are black.

You think you know this but trust me when I say – don’t spray into the wind. Lesson learned…again.

10 months later, this gate looks about as good as it did when I painted it. Next we’ll do the big rusty gate, though it’s a lower priority since I don’t look at it every day from the house.

We’re in need of some more gates and we’re thinking of building our round pen with these 12 foot gate sections. But I’m at the point where I need to decide on painted or galvanized. Painted looks nicer…at first. I don’t know how long this paint job of ours will last but I sure don’t want to paint gates every year. I don’t want to spend the time or the money. Paint for this little gate cost us almost $20 and a new painted gate isn’t much more than that. I’m strongly considering galvanized. I think in the long run we’ll save money.